Blind Your Ponies by Stanley Gordon West Read Free Book Online

loose-fitting cotton blouse. “Thanks for waiting,” she said. She paused to catch her breath.
    “What can I do for you?” he asked, then smiled.
    “I hope I’m not sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong, but I talked with Olaf today and I think he’s seriously considering playing basketball.”
    “What gives you that impression?” Sam picked up on the excitement in her voice and he couldn’t help but notice the natural little pout of her lower lip.
    “I don’t know exactly. It was something in his tone. I think he’s just afraid of looking clumsy, right when he’s trying to get to know some of the kids. I can sure identify with that. I mean, who wants to be laughed at?” She met his eyes. “Anyway, he’s a little on the defensive, with good reason, but I think he’ll play.”
    “Even if he decides to play, he’s never touched a basketball. He can’t learn enough to help much in just ten or twelve weeks,” Sam said.
    “Okay, it’s a long shot, I grant you, but take a look around.” She gestured at the town’s old buildings along Main Street. “Look where we’re standing for God’s sake. What else have you got to do? How often in a lifetime do you think you’ll have a seven-foot center to coach?”
    “I’m not coaching.”
    “I know. And what are you going to do about
that
?”She gazed into his eyes, as though she could see into his heart. Sam ducked from her encroachment by turning to the kids behind them. She took a hold of his arm and squeezed gently. “I hope I haven’t been a busybody, but I just couldn’t let it go without talking to you. Forgive me if—”
    “No, it’s all right. Thanks for your interest.”
    “I’ve got to run,” she said. “See you tomorrow.”
    She hurried across Main and drove away in her black Volvo while Sam stood alone, his thoughts and feelings muddled beyond sorting. From the far edge of the court he smiled at Megan Riley, a sixth grader. She hugged the basketball to her chest.
    “Ya want a shot, Mr. Pickett?” Megan asked.
    “Sure.”
    She tossed him the ball. Sam caught it with one arm and threw his sport coat to the ground. He rolled the scuffed old ball in his hands, took aim, and let it fly. Swish.
    “Awesome shot, Mr. Pickett! That’d be a three-pointer for sure,” Megan said with pure adulation in her voice.
    “Aw, that’s nothing,” Carol Rudd said. “He’s the
basketball coach.
”
    F RIDAY AFTERNOON, AFTER the students had boisterously left the building, Sam approached Truly Osborn’s office and found the superintendent at his desk in his typical vest and shirtsleeves, earnestly digging earwax with a paper clip. He hesitated, then knocked on Truly’s open door.
    Truly twirled in his wooden chair and recovered quickly into his professional posture. “Yes, what is it, Sam?”
    Sam thought Truly to be a sad man, a white dwarf, a star whose light we still see streaming toward us in the night sky long after it has lost all energy. Truly managed the proper manners of a school administrator on the surface while inside, Sam suspected, he had given up on life, had burned out and died. It scared Sam, and he worried he’d share the same fate twenty years down the institutional highway.
    “Since I talked with you a couple weeks ago,” Sam said, “I’ve been thinking about the basketball team.”
    “The basketball team?”
    “Yes. I was wondering if you’d talked to Mr. Grant about coaching?”
    “No, I haven’t gotten around to it yet. It’s not as though there’s any hurry, with all this to take care of.” Truly waved the back of his hand at the files and papers stacked on his desk, stacks that had a familiar haphazardness, leading Sam to suspect they were decoys giving the appearance of busyness.
    “Well,” Sam said, “I’ve changed my mind, if it’s all right with you and the school board. I’d like to coach for another season.”
    “You’d what?” Truly snapped up straight in his chair, startling Sam back a